| NOTAS: | "A popular version of Moore’s law means the doubling of computer capacity every 18 months. This continuing development challenges not only economic structures and traditional businesses, but finally also many legal institutions. The examples of these challenges are clearly seen especially in areas of personal data protection and copyright, which are discussed in this document. The challenges of legal institutions in light of the ICT development are many. Legal institutions have developed during very long periods of time based on geographical restrictions and the geographical organization of national states. The internet changes geography as we know it. The legal institutions matching the global, seamless operation of the internet are still developing. Law-making as a rule is a slow and tedious process. The European Union – or any other multinational organization for that matter - is a challenging environment from the viewpoint of rapid law-making. And it does not help that we tend to build laws on existing business models, which in the internet age may become obsolete very quickly. This makes the legal adaptation to the challenges of Moore’s law even more difficult. The question becomes, in what way we may have to rethink our traditional, European legal culture? The parliamentary law-making process is seen as the main source of law in Europe, but we may have to accept a parallel source of law in the more dynamic - yet more uncertain- court practices in law-making regarding technology sensitive areas such as the internet. Many questions arise from this point of view – what are the ultimate rights of users that we have to protect, not only as citizens and individuals, but also as producers of their own ‘Life Data’? What is the new role of state institutions and courts in this legally very challenging ICT-environment? And is there a degree of flexibility that we have to tolerate to encourage risk-taking needed in innovation and growth of the ICT-sector? The report puts forward these questions, concentrating especially on individual’s Life Data. It seems evident – whether we like it or not, whether we planned it or not – that we are heading towards a future where law-making also takes place in the courts, i.e. new, technology-related common law. This requires a system of strong basic, fundamental rights, but we are bound to face the fact that the rapid ICT development may keep the traditional legislative law-making processes lagging behind. It seems highly likely, that the courts, and the Court of Justice in the European Union in the forefront, will face increasing need for expertise in technology and ICT-related areas. From innovation perspective, however, the development may allow for more risk-taking in product development, moving legal supervision from ex ante to ex post." |
